Thanks franknbeans! I'm sure I will have tons of fun. The horse I will be riding belongs to Kim, the lady who owns the barn/horses where I teach lessons. You have to bring your own horse to Cindy Lewis, so Kim is letting me use Chexx, she's a QH, about 10 years old, so I will be able to work with her coming up to this lesson. Worked with her today after a lesson and she's fussy about collecting, but we made substantial progress today. I figure collection is paramount in reining, so that was my focus today. One of the apprentices at the barn today said "yeah, she doesn't like to collect but she's so good at everything else that we just let her be" Whaaattt?? Ok, well... you do that... I will work on collecting her. haha. I'm concerned about learning to rein on a horse that is not a reiner, but Kim assures me that she will help me prepare Chexx and she seems to think it will be okay so... We'll see.
Muppetgirl: that makes perfect sense. getting them to use their hind end and pick up the front end for a turn. I shall have to do that with Chexx.

Is Chexx reining trained? It is really difficult to learn and teach the horse at the same time....speaking from personal experience here. I would be really careful what you "work on" until you are taught how to do so by the reining person. It is much easier to teach it right the first time than fix a horse that has learned (been taught) it wrong.

Thanks for the advice franknbeans. You're right, it's easier to teach it right the first time. I spoke with Kim and she said I'm working on exactly what I need to with her. I'm not a novice rider, and this isn't the first time I have worked on teaching a horse to collect. She asked if Chexx was being fussy about it and I said yes. She expressed frustration with not having the time or enough experienced riders to expect collection. She is used as a beginner lesson horse a lot of the time. She said "oh yeah, ryder (another horse) has actually done this class before. You could try him and see if you like him better" He's a 5 year old QH gelding. So I'm going to ride him today after my lesson (teaching, not taking. Haha) and see if he will collect better. Thank you for the wise advice though!Posted via Mobile Device

So, my lesson didn't show up today, (bummer) so I got some extra time to ride. Here's a picture of Ryder, the 5 yr QH. Rode him today and I like him better than Chexx. He collects a little better but his backing needs work. He's catching on quickly though. Got him from being really resistant when backing to taking a couple of steps back without me having to even pick up the reins. I left it at that, on a good note. Next time I'll ask for more willingness and pep in his step when backing up. His trot is big and smooth, I love it. Unfortunately we won't be needing that whilst reining. :)

Ok.. So I had my first Reining Clinic with Cindy Lewis on Monday.
The BO is on a 10 yr mare- Velvet, and I am on 5 yr gelding - Ryder, pictured above. She starts talking and, between scattered curse words, tells me the first thing I need to do (before she sees me ride, after I tell her I used to teach equitation) was to throw all of my position out the window, that I wouldn't need it and would be doing whatever it took to get the desired response from the horse. She also said that we need to have control over the 5 body parts of the horse - head, neck, shoulders, barrel, hip. So for the head, she said to bump with my legs and that was my horse's cue to drop his head. So we worked on that a little. Then the neck, bending each way. Then the shoulders. take reins across neck, spur with outside leg, step, was the idea. So we start working on this and the horse isn't taking a step. She says "Pull harder, spur harder, kick! kick! kick!" so I'm pulling, kicking, spurring and horse is not moving shoulder. Moving all over but not shoulder, so she is yelling at me to pull harder, to kick harder, so I keep pulling and kicking, and the horse starts to come up to rear, I instinctively start to push him forward as she screams "kick him! forward!!" He goes forward and she says to kick his booty and punish him. Then she says "That's the kind of stuff that's going to get someone killed! That's it, I'm getting on him." She borrows a pair of boots with spurs from another person there, since she had hiking shoes on, and climbs up on the horse, (I noticed she mounted by pulling the horn and cantle, just an observation.) and she gets on and starts doing the same thing, asking for his shoulder to move by pulling, spurring, ramping up to full-force kicking the horse with one spur in the side, and after trying multiple outs including standing still and flinching with each kick, he rears, BAD. so she drives him forward and continues kicking him full force with both spurs. This goes on for a while and then she gets off and the owner of the horse gets on. Same thing continues to happen and the horse rears even worse, and the owner almost came off. Then they get out a piece of wood someone found in the barn, a 1" by 2" (and about a foot long) board broken off of something (sharp at one end) and they proceed to hit the horse on the shoulder and rump with the board. Someone brought out a 2'x4' but it was too long for the owner to hold. So, everyone there is hooping and hollering and cheering the girls on. The horse did not reach the desired goal by the end of the lesson. I have tried my best to present an objective observation, I will add my own opinion to an extent -
I don't feel the horse knew what was being asked of him. I don't feel that the request was fair. But I also don't have very much experience with training. To the reining trainers out there, does this sound right? Because if this is what reining is all about, I'm not so sure it's the discipline for me.

Ok.. So I had my first Reining Clinic with Cindy Lewis on Monday.
The BO is on a 10 yr mare- Velvet, and I am on 5 yr gelding - Ryder, pictured above. She starts talking and, between scattered curse words, tells me the first thing I need to do (before she sees me ride, after I tell her I used to teach equitation) was to throw all of my position out the window, that I wouldn't need it and would be doing whatever it took to get the desired response from the horse. She also said that we need to have control over the 5 body parts of the horse - head, neck, shoulders, barrel, hip. So for the head, she said to bump with my legs and that was my horse's cue to drop his head. So we worked on that a little. Then the neck, bending each way. Then the shoulders. take reins across neck, spur with outside leg, step, was the idea. So we start working on this and the horse isn't taking a step. She says "Pull harder, spur harder, kick! kick! kick!" so I'm pulling, kicking, spurring and horse is not moving shoulder. Moving all over but not shoulder, so she is yelling at me to pull harder, to kick harder, so I keep pulling and kicking, and the horse starts to come up to rear, I instinctively start to push him forward as she screams "kick him! forward!!" He goes forward and she says to kick his booty and punish him. Then she says "That's the kind of stuff that's going to get someone killed! That's it, I'm getting on him." She borrows a pair of boots with spurs from another person there, since she had hiking shoes on, and climbs up on the horse, (I noticed she mounted by pulling the horn and cantle, just an observation.) and she gets on and starts doing the same thing, asking for his shoulder to move by pulling, spurring, ramping up to full-force kicking the horse with one spur in the side, and after trying multiple outs including standing still and flinching with each kick, he rears, BAD. so she drives him forward and continues kicking him full force with both spurs. This goes on for a while and then she gets off and the owner of the horse gets on. Same thing continues to happen and the horse rears even worse, and the owner almost came off. Then they get out a piece of wood someone found in the barn, a 1" by 2" (and about a foot long) board broken off of something (sharp at one end) and they proceed to hit the horse on the shoulder and rump with the board. Someone brought out a 2'x4' but it was too long for the owner to hold. So, everyone there is hooping and hollering and cheering the girls on. The horse did not reach the desired goal by the end of the lesson. I have tried my best to present an objective observation, I will add my own opinion to an extent -
I don't feel the horse knew what was being asked of him. I don't feel that the request was fair. But I also don't have very much experience with training. To the reining trainers out there, does this sound right? Because if this is what reining is all about, I'm not so sure it's the discipline for me.

Nope.....a good reining trainer won't go to that extent of performing to get a horse to move its shoulder...I've been on a horse who wouldn't move his shoulder and the more you bumped him with your heel or spur, the more he braced.....what worked was rolling the spur on him until he took and itty bitty step sideways.
I'd be embarrassed by my behaviour if I was that trainer. And I've seen some real good ones in action, and in tricky/difficult situations and they have all kept their cool and got the job done....or walked away and given the horse time to breath. I'm not a reining trainer....but I do know how the good ones respond, and they don't react like that. Yeah sometimes you need to thump your heel on a horse, but they just learn to brace against your foot.

Just a side note....I'm short so I use the cantle and the horn to get on my horse....I just can't get both hands up on that horn and my foot in the stirrup at the same time.....not enough streeeeeeetch!

Ok, thank you for the reply muppetgirl. There were probably 10 people watching, all yelling "yeah! Kick his (expletive)!!" "He's being such a brat!". I was the only one silent. I'm not a trainer, so I just kept my mouth shut. I rode this horse about 4 times before this, and he never offered to rear with me. The first time I rode him, he was really resistant to backing up, and at the end of it I had him backing up just off of my seat. A week before I started riding him, one of the apprentices was riding him and pulled him over on her. I felt like he should have been rewarded for even shifting his weight in the direction I was asking. But again, I'm not a trainer and I have never taken a horse all the way from start to finish.

You are right to be unnerved by this. It was good you were quiet while all this was going on. Hmmmm I would want to back away quietly from this crowd and perhaps quietly seek out a 'cleaner' trainer.....I'm not a trainer either, but I wouldn't want to learn from someone who does not respect the animal they make their living from..... I've seen trainers spank and over and under horses, but for serious behaviour, like major crow hopping etc........but not have a 'fight' with a horse and let themselves be egged on by a whole bunch of people....it's hard for me to explain what I'm detecting here.....but it's not quite right

Ok, thanks. I'm glad it's not just me being naive. Hopefully I can find another reiner to work with. I'm pretty bummed because I was really excited for that, and have always wanted to learn how to rein.

You need a different "trainer" (term used VERY loosely in this case). Nothing good will happen with this one. I would certainly not continue using any of those methods, and I don't understand how the owner of the horse could sit there and watch this. There is no need for it. Yes, move forward, and try and get the horse to move his shoulder. Pay really close attention, reward the slightest effort and build on that.

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